TALBOT HOTEL “SPORTING HERO” AWARD FOR JULY 2011

This year Marcus from Tinryland in Carlow, who’s only 16 years old reached new heights by reaching the qualifying standard for 200m in the World youth Under 18 Championships in Lille, France and also the qualifying standard for the 200M in European Youth Olympics in Trabzon, Turkey.

Marcus reached the semi-final at the World youths and in doing so broke the Irish Youths Record.

Two weeks later he reached the final of the European Youth Olympics 200m and once again broke the Youths Record running an incredible time of 21.61.

However Marcus’s ability hasn’t just been shown this year, while he got into athletics at the age of 8, when he was 12 and 13 years old he was winning all the little events his mum and dad entered him in and then progressed on to win two individual Community Games gold medals and numerous relay medals at National Finals in Mosney which by any standard is a great yard stick.

It was after this that he joined the St Laurence O Toole club and from then entered in and competed in AAI (Athletic Association Ireland) competitions at provincial and national level.

I think the encouraging thing about Marcus is, he’s only 16 years old and only moved on to International level at 14 and within that short space of time has shown what he can do at a high level.

Taking into account the journey he has taken in a short space of time, it was fitting that the KCLR96FM and Talbot Hotel “Sporting Hero Award” for July 2011 be awarded to Marcus Lawler.